“Look, Angel—”
“Don’t call me that,” she snapped, drawing herself up tall despite the sudden ache in her side…the pain of a wounded pride, a stark reminder of her foolishness.
He sighed dispiritedly. “You’re misunderstanding me. It just…it was a shock to hear him say he’d planned for you and me to get together. Don’t tell me it didn’t flatten you as well. I just need some time to absorb it all.”
Angeline shook her head as the truth settled on her chest like a weight. “I don’t believe it. Could you be any more obvious, Alex?”
Fire flickered in his blue eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked slowly.
“Just that the idea of fucking me seemed real appealing to you when you thought you were screwing dear daddy over in the process. But the second you find out you were actually dancing to your father’s tune all along, doing exactly what he wanted…well I suddenly don’t seem too interesting anymore, do I, Alex? Mitchell always said you were a rebel without a clue.”
“That’s not what I meant at all,” he roared. He closed his eyes as if he’d been surprised by the fury in his voice. “Goddammit, Angeline,” he said more quietly. “Please don’t make this worse than it is.”
Angeline had never really tasted bitterness before that moment.
“Of course. I wouldn’t want this to be any harder on you than it already is, Alex. You say you need some time? Tell you what. You’ve got all the time in the world.”
She’d stormed off into the bathroom and slammed the door, turning on the faucet so Alex wouldn’t hear her furious, bitter crying.
It was incredible. She’d given herself so completely to him. It made her cringe to think of how she’d submitted utterly to him sexually…submitted to her own flagrant desire.
And it had felt so good…so right.
How could she have given so much trust to such an unworthy man?
Angeline needn’t have turned on the faucet to muffle her tears of hurt and shame at her own stupidity. When she’d exited the bathroom a while later, she was alone in the house. She’d grabbed her bag and made a beeline for the back door, determined to free her SUV from the snow and ice now that she had plenty of bright sunshine to see what she was doing.
She’d paused at the back door, another wave of hurt going through her when she saw her SUV parked in the driveway.
Obviously Alex had wanted to hasten her departure.
Even though the sun shone gloriously after the snowstorm, Angeline saw everything in gray as she tossed her duffel bag into the passenger seat. The keys were in the ignition. Alex must have left them there. She was surprised he hadn’t left the motor running.
She drove to Chicago without stopping once, her mind churning furiously the whole time. One thing kept occurring to her like a refrain from a song she couldn’t stop replaying in her head. It echoed around her skull even as she sat there numbly in her lonely condominium that night.
She’d been the queen of all idiots for throwing herself into the crap that existed between Mitchell and Alex Carradine. It hurt like hell to think of how rigid and cold Alex’s ruggedly handsome face looked there at the end, but she had no one but herself to blame.
She stood wearily from her couch, her eyes glued to her small, fake Christmas tree. She couldn’t help but recall the perfect, fragrant tree Alex had cut down for her, couldn’t stop herself from recalling how his smile reached all the way to his blue eyes as he’d watched her while she made a show of switching on the lights once it was decorated.
She grabbed her duffel bag and headed down the hallway to her bedroom. She didn’t even bother to unpack, just wiggled out of her jeans, tossed off her sweater and fell onto her bed.
“Merry effing Christmas,” she muttered bitterly as she pulled the covers over her head. She clamped her burning eyelids shut, determined to forget the past several days of her life had ever occurred.
Two days later, she sat in the back of a cab on her way from the offices of Littleton, Marks and Carradine to her condominium. The fact that she was practically the only person left working on the entire floor had gotten to her finally and she’d fled her office an hour early. She hadn’t planned on returning to work until tomorrow, her original intent had been to stay with Mitchell at his son’s resort until today.
Given the circumstances, she’d surprised her administrative assistant by returning to work the day after Christmas. Thankfully, she’d heard through the grapevine that Mitchell had stuck to his original vacation plans and hadn’t yet returned to the office.
It’d been bad enough keeping her thoughts focused on work—forcing her thoughts away from Alex Carradine—without having to worry about running into Mitchell as well.
She wondered, as she stared blankly out the cab window onto the snow-covered curb on Dearborn Avenue, if Mitchell would avoid returning to work as long as he sported the black eye Alex had given him. Just like she had on Christmas Day, Angeline experienced a savage feeling of satisfaction at the memory of Alex clocking his father while Mitchell stared at her so condescendingly.
What a jerk.
Obviously, she wasn’t doing a very good job of erasing either of the Carradine men from her mind altogether. It’d become exponentially more difficult to forget Alex ever since she’d finally gotten around to unpacking her duffel bag this morning.
Ever since she’d discovered what had been tucked between a sweater and a pair of jeans.
In her mind’s eye, she replayed for the thousandth time finding the hand-carved angel inside her duffel bag.